Elder Advice – Thinking Inside the Box- Week 11
Apologies for the delay. This week has been hard. And for a guy with a chronic case of not being John Hamm, that’s saying something. It has been more difficulty than usual to rearrange the same words you can find in the Oxford dictionary to convey the desired message. Because there is always worry about the potential backlash from even a misplaced comma in a world where taking offense is considered an occupation. I found myself struggling to follow my own, always sage, advice about keeping a sense of humour. Because events this week have been so troubling. And we have enough troubles right now - like the consequences of COVID-19, and people who use prepositions to end a sentence with.
But I would be remiss if I did not observe and comment on this time of protest, born of long-term grievances and pent-up frustration at being pent-up. As I watched the boarding up of streets downtown on Friday and Saturday, I thought: how profoundly un-Canadian.
No right-thinking Canadian disputes the broadest interpretation of the right to protest, peacefully, about anything, anytime. And even though we are typically quiet complainers - in keeping with our historically militant view of “Peace, Order and Good Government” - the loudest of peaceful protests must be tolerated.
No right-thinking Canadian can support the right to protest violently. Advocating and committing unlawful acts, including putting the health and safety of others in jeopardy and destroying public and private property, must be intolerable.
The larger the protest, the greater the duty of all involved to ensure that those who participate do not endanger public safety or otherwise engage in unlawful activity. What troubles me now (apart from the silence of both protest organizers and public authorities about health concerns, including the protestors’ abject failure at physical distancing) is the failure to take steps to ensure that those who participate in protests with bad-faith agendas are rejected as soon as that agenda becomes known, and further, are identified to authorities. You heard me. There is an obligation to snitch. And that is for the collective good – including all those who protest in good faith. Because no legitimate protest should be in peril of being demeaned in the public mind because of the mischief of a few. Your mother no doubt told you that snitching is the right thing to do when it is a good faith effort to prevent bad outcomes. Friends have likely told you, since grade school, that snitching is a heinous offense. They were usually the ones who you should have snitched on. You know your mother was almost always right. And she was certainly right about this.
But, like most streets, this one is two-way. Given they swear an oath to serve and protect, the police have a greater obligation to snitch. The focus of protesters’ attention this week stemmed initially from the unspeakable, undisputed, unlawful conduct of police officers. People I know and respect who work with me in the justice system, who have direct personal knowledge and who include people of colour, tell me that 95%+ of front-line officers are decent, honest, hardworking, and law-abiding. I believe them. And I believe it is manifestly unfair to taint those officers and the many others who work in the system with amorphous allegations of “systemic racism”. But there can be little doubt that we would not be in this place if there was no conspiracy of silence in the rank and file of police forces. Or police unions which, by defending the indefensible, promote the interests of those officers who misconduct themselves. If the “bad apples in the barrel” argument is to be given credence, it is long past time to go apple picking. If there is an obligation on the part of everyone to say something, there can be no exceptions, especially for those who have a sworn obligation to do something.
That said, I would like to offer this Elder Advice. With the very greatest respect, please stop labelling and making allegations about “systemic” everything.
Many such allegations are controversial on the reliable data. Others rely on claims that Canada is no different than the United States, which are as odious as they are ridiculous. All such allegations expressly or impliedly presume bad faith, or at least complicity, on the part of everyone connected with “the system”. And that is unfair and untrue. Instead of selectively focusing on race, gender, age, orientation and or any one of the other myriad ways we are distinguishable, one from another, can we collectively insist that: Everyone deserves to be treated equally and respectfully by everyone else. Period. It is a black and white issue – which is not intended to reference race but rather, the absence of any shade of grey. Your mother told you to treat people that way, and again, unsurprisingly, your mother was right. Like your mother, I have never understood the post-modern aversion to simplicity and the desire to make everything needlessly complex and contentious. The simple concept is not hard to grasp, and once grasped, will allow us to end the selective debates and protests about consequences of the problem and get on with the overdue task of solving it. By “us”, I mean everyone. And by “it”, I mean the underlying cause of all justifiable discontent - inequality that stems from lack of equal opportunity. And by “solving”, I mean reforming public education so every Canadian child has an equal opportunity to succeed from the earliest possible time in life. It may not be the whole solution, but it’s an excellent start.
Some may suggest that idea is like internet fridges or Peter McKay- if it was going to catch on, it would have by now. They may be right, but I live in hope.